


First (in the) Pecking Order

by kereia



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Bad Ending, Bad Puns, Crack, Dark Comedy, Gen, Humor, Kylo Ren is a chicken, LITERALLY, No one knows why, Please Don't Hate Me, Swearing, and for god's sake no one take this seriously, bad puns everywhere, everyone is ooc, least of all Rey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-10
Updated: 2018-09-10
Packaged: 2019-07-10 19:51:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15956327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kereia/pseuds/kereia
Summary: When the stormtroopers overpower her on Takodana and drag her aboard one of the First Order shuttles, Rey has a fairly good idea of what her immediate future will hold.Imprisonment. Intimidation. Quite possibly torture.So when she wakes up strapped to an interrogation chair, she's not surprised.The thing that does catch her off-guard, though, is the chicken.





	First (in the) Pecking Order

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Artemis1000](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/gifts).



> Dear Artemis1000,
> 
> Thank you so much for requesting this tag. It was fun to write, and I really hope that I didn't completely miss the mark.
> 
> (And I'm sorry pulled the story down initially, but I really wasn't sure if the ending worked.)
> 
> * * * * *
> 
> Many thanks to Prinzenhasserin for the beta and for talking me out of my own head.
> 
> Written for the prompt:" Everything is the same except Kylo Ren is a chicken."
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **Please mind the tags.**

When the stormtroopers overpower her on Takodana, take Luke's lightsaber away from her, and drag her aboard one of the First Order shuttles, Rey has a fairly good idea of what her immediate future will hold.

Imprisonment. Intimidation. Quite possibly torture.

So when she wakes up strapped to an interrogation chair, she's not surprised.

The thing that does catch her off-guard, though, is the chicken.

She expects to be greeted by an interrogator – a sight that fits into the whole 'demoralization and terror' theme that the First Order is apparently going for with their sleek monochrome aesthetic. So it's forgivable, she thinks, if she feels a little taken aback when the first thing she see upon opening her eyes, is a rooster scratching its claws against the floor.

In a detached sort of way, Rey has to admit that – as far as roosters go – it's a rather impressive specimen. Large – there's plenty of meat on it, she thinks, keenly aware of the emptiness inside her stomach – with glossy, black plumage, and long, red tail feathers which curve in a perfect arch behind him and display an appropriate amount of springiness.

It's also wearing a mask.

It's the kind of leather hood that domesticated birds of prey wear just before they're released to hunt and that Rey only knows about because she saw it in a holovid once.

Thus blind, the chicken stalks rather aimlessly across the polished metal floor, leaving Rey to blink in befuddlement as she follows its erratic path with her eyes.

Just when she's contemplating just what kind of strange interrogation methods the First Order is employing, the doors behind her slide open, and Rey watches as a young man with short, red hair circles around her.

In spite of his immaculately slicked back hair, he looks rather harried, which is further exacerbated by the expression of relief that flits across his face when he lays eyes on the chicken.

"Ah, there you are," he grumbles in a clipped accent, and hurries across the floor.

He bends to scoop up the chicken, but said chicken has other ideas.

It launches itself at him, wings fluttering rapidly, and the man recoils, hands grasping into thin air as the chicken pecks him in the nose.

It's aim is... uncannily accurate considering the mask.

"Aaahh, you bloody... you damned, kriffing demon spawn."

A short, violent wrestling match ensues, and Rey watches, her eyebrows slowly creeping up her forehead, as man and chicken battle for dominance.

It's the weirdest interrogation Rey has ever experienced.

Not that she's experienced any, really, but somehow she gets the impression that no matter how many of these there are to follow, this one will be hard to top.

"I do apologize for this," the man says, finally addressing her, once he manages to subdue the chicken. "He runs away all the time, but somehow he always ends up where he needs to be."

Rey really doesn't know what to say to that.

The man straightens. "Right. I am General Hux, and you will tell me where Luke Skywalker is."

Rey remains silent.

"You really should tell me, you know. This could go very badly for you, if you don't."

She says nothing.

Hux steps closer to her, his expression severe and full of gravitas.

"You will answer me, scavenger, or I will leave you at the mercy of Kylo Ren." He brandishes the squawking chicken at her, close enough to make Rey's eyes cross. "The Jedi killer, left hand of Supreme Leader Snoke, Master of the Knights of Ren, and..."

"Uhm... excuse me?" Rey interrupts, waving her hands shyly in her shackles when Hux looks down at her. "Hi. I'm sorry to interrupt, but just so we're clear, you _are_ talking about the– the chicken, right?"

"Ah... yes?"

"Right. Sorry. Do go on, then."

He opens his mouth, closes it again, and looks at her, a faint blush rising to his cheeks. "Where was I?"

"Kylo Ren, Jedi Killer, Master of the Knights of Hen," Rey supplies helpfully.

"Ren. Knights of _Ren._ "

"You sure about that?"

He scowls. "Very."

"Because it makes me sad when people ignore a perfectly good set up for a bad pun." Rey says, risking a slight pout for emphasis.

Hux glares at her.

Rey shrugs. "Hey, I grew up in a desert. You kinda learn to make your own fun."

Hux ignores her, clears his throat, and goes back to his speech, adding an extra layer of drama to his intonation as he holds the chicken in her face again.

"Master of the Knights of Ren, and harbinger of your doom," he finishes with a distinct air of satisfaction.

A soft splat falls into the dramatic silence, and Hux closes his eyes in mortification as Rey cranes her neck to look down at his formerly immaculately polished boots.

She clears her throat. "Do you think you could give me a minute?" she asks hesitantly.

Eyes still closed and chicken still held between them, Hux sighs. "Why?"

"It just... well, you see, I've never been threatened with poultry before. Starvation, exposure, blaster rifles, some really creative uses for a Bantha's shaved horn, if you believe that sort of thing, sure, but I'm going to need a moment to dredge up the appropriate amount of terror here, so if you could just... you know... give me a minute to dig deep and..." she makes a vague gesture with her shackled hand and Hux visibly deflates.

"It's okay, you're not the first person who reacts this way."

He looks so thoroughly dejected, that Rey can't help but try to cheer him up.

"Don't get me wrong. It's not that chickens can't be terrifying. I've seen some truly disturbing things on Jakku."

"Oh, I agree, they can be utterly vicious little bastards."

Rey nods enthusiastically.

"One of the older scavengers kept a small coop, and you should have seen how they went after the skittermice that tried to steal their eggs. Five of them reduced that poor creature to nothing but a pile of dry bones in under a minute." She shivers dramatically. "It was fascinating to watch."

Hux looks a little pale around his nose.

"I was curious how long it would take them to rip apart something bigger, so I went out and caught a lizard. You know, one of the bigger ones, but the scavenger caught me throwing it into the coop and told me off, so..."

"You really _do_ make your own fun," Hux says faintly. There's an odd look on his face.

Rey shrugs. She considers the chicken in front of her for a moment.

"I think the problem is that chickens just don't _look_ menacing. They're kind of goofy, really. With their heads going back and forth like that."

"I suppose."

"Though I have to admit that this one's plumage is very impressive... very fluffy," she says consolingly.

He appears pleased. "Thank you. Snoke makes me groom him for two hours every morning."

"No way!"

Hux nods bashfully.

"Well, you're doing a marvelous job, General." Rey says, her voice dripping with sincerity.

Hux blushes to the tips of his ears. He leans in, conspiratorially. "Do you want to know a secret? About how I get his feathers so glossy?"

Rey nods eagerly. "Do tell."

"It's the special feed I give him."

And then he launches into a lecture about chicken grooming and dietary requirements that has Rey thinking that the First Order's interrogation methods may be unusual, but they are far more effective than she previously thought, because after about two and a half minutes of this, she seriously considers telling Hux whatever he wants to know just so he will shut up.

"You know," she interrupts him desperately as he launches into a particularly excruciating tangent about claw trimming, "I think as vicious as that chicken may be, you are much more intimidating on your own."

Hux gapes at her. "You really think so?"

Rey nods decisively. "Yes. It's the uniform. And those marvelous cheekbones. Why, they look sharp enough to cut glass. It's very attra... atrociously menacing, really."

Hux looks quite chuffed at hearing this. "Why, thank you. That's the kindest thing anyone's ever said to me."

"Though, I have to say, the random feathers undercut the effect a little."

"Feathers?"

"On your collar. I think they got stuck there when you chased after the chicken."

"Oh.. uhm. Hold on. I..."

He lifts his hands, but he's still holding the chicken, and the rooster immediately starts to struggle. Hux barely manages to hold on to it.

"I could help you, if you unshackled my hands," Rey offers guilelessly.

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"Oh, come on, now. You can chain me up again after."

Hux appears indecisive as his gaze jumps from the chicken to Rey and back again, so Rey presses on. "It would be a shame if any of those stormtroopers saw you in such disarray," she coaxes.

She watches with no small amount of glee as her words sink in.

"Well, no, of course not. That wouldn't do at all."

He walks to the wall and presses his elbow to the button that will release her shackles, when a blast of Force lightning suddenly tears through the interrogation room.

Rey flinches as Hux crumbles to the ground, unconscious. The chicken squawks in distress and flutters across the floor.

A figure appears in front of Rey. Towering and translucent, it looks as if a cacodemon mated with a sabercat, and the resulting eldritch abomination had assumed a vaguely humanoid form and donned a golden bathrobe.

"Who the hell are you?" Rey blurts out, too startled to remember her sense of self-preservation.

"I am someone who sees your potential," the man says with a creepy smile. "You, little scavenger, need a teacher."

Rubbing her wrists gingerly, Rey slips out of the interrogation chair.

"I'm doing fine on my own, thanks."

She slowly edges her body around the chair and moves towards the door, bracing herself for another bolt of lightning.

It never comes. The apparition merely smiles its sabercat smile at her.

"I am Supreme Leader Snoke," he says just when she reaches the access panel that controls the doors. "And we will meet again."

Rey jabs the button, and grabs Luke's lightsaber from a nearby table. "If you say so."

"Remember to save the chicken," he says with a faint laugh that raises goose-flesh on her arms.

Then the doors open and Snoke disappears.

 

* * *

 

"That was so weird," Rey mumbles as she steps out into the hallway.

She nearly collides with Finn, who comes running around the corner.

"Rey! Oh maker, you're okay." He crushes her to him, and she wraps her arms tightly around his neck. "We've been looking all over for you."

Han appears behind him, slightly out of breath, and Rey grins up at both of them.

"I can't believe you guys came to rescue me."

Finn grins at her. "Rescue you and plant a bunch of bombs in the thermal oscillator," he says with pride. "This place is going to blow."

Behind her, the chicken shoots out of the interrogation room, and rushes squawking and fluttering down the hall.

Han does a double take. "Ben," he calls out and dashes after it.

Finn looks about as confused as Rey feels. "Who's Ben?"

"We have to save the chicken," Han yells over his shoulder. "We're not leaving without him."

"Why?" Rey shouts back.

"Because he's my son."

"But... but he's a chicken."

"I know."

"I'm confused."

But Han is already around the next corner and out of sight, leaving Finn and Rey no choice but to hurry after him.

 

* * *

 

They run after Han who's running after the chicken through labyrinthine corridors until they reach a cavernous room without a floor or ceiling.

"Oh, great. We're right back where we started," Finn says next to her.

When Rey looks up, she can see the sun fade, its energy drawn deep into the planet's core.

Their only protection from the heat and radiation is a containment field that shields the circular walkway surrounding the channel beyond the railing.

The chicken's claws click, click, click a rapid staccato across the floor as it runs onto the metal catwalk that spans the yawning chasm, and Han rushes heedless after it, calling his son's name.

And Rey can see how this is going to go, can see the future unfold before her eyes. The chicken, blind behind its mask, the narrow footbridge, the railing that for _some unfathomable_ reason has gaps in it, the gaping abyss lurking beneath them.

She pushes herself harder, dashes onto the catwalk (the chicken squawks and stops) her feet are pounding across the metal (Han is almost there, has almost reached it) her heart is thundering inside her chest (the chicken flaps its wings and launches itself through the railing).

Han flings himself after it, just as Rey reaches him, digs her fingers into the back of his belt and yanks him backwards. She uses her own momentum to reach for the chicken, and her fingers find purchase in the long, red tail feathers.

She pulls.

The tail feathers come off in her hand.

She loses her balance, tips over, her hands desperately grasping for the chicken. The feathers she just plugged off his butt float gently into the bottomless pit as if in slow motion.

Rey falls.

The catwalk disappears beside her just when her hands finally close around the chicken's legs.

For one breathless moment, she thinks she's going to die.

Then there's a sharp tug on her ankle as her entire weight tears at it, and she cries out in pain.

When she looks up, Finn and Han are both holding on to her foot, while she dangles below the catwalk, an indignantly squawking chicken fluttering upside down in her grasp.

 

* * *

 

Far from being grateful that Rey saved its life, the chicken takes out its ire over Rey's manhandling by pecking at her hands the minute Han and Finn pull the two of them back onto the catwalk.

It only gets one good jab in before Finn scoops it up, folds its wings tight against its body, and Han gently takes its mask off before tearfully embracing his lost son. Said lost son immediately seizes the opportunity to sink his beak into Han's ear, but instead of wringing his neck, like Rey would have done, Han merely scolds him halfheartedly.

After Starkiller Base explodes in a cloud of dust, and the Millennium Falcon jumps into hyperspace, Rey sinks into the Falcon's lounge seat and patches up her bleeding hand. The chicken watches her sullenly from the other side of the room.

It sidles along the technical station, careful to keep its bare butt turned away from them and shielded by his partially extended wings.

Rey watches it's progress with a scowl as she rubs bacta gel onto her finger.

Finn enters from the galley and crouches down next to it, extending the small leather mask. "I can put this on your behind, if you want," he says, and the chicken goes still. "So you won't get cold."

Rey doesn't quite know if she wants to laugh of cry, but the chicken allows Finn to place the hooded mask on top of its butt. It cranes its neck and twitches its tail experimentally. Rey isn't sure if it wants to ascertain that the mask won't slip off when it moves, or if it's appraising the mask's aesthetical value, but she decides not to comment. The day is weird enough as it is.

Beside her, Han makes a pleased noise. "I can't believe I got him back," he says, gruffly.

He's standing next to the lounge seat, his hands braced on his hips as he looks at his son with misty eyes. "Leia... his mother will be so happy."

"So, was it Snoke who turned him into a chicken?" Rey asks.

"What? No. No one did."

Rey tries to take this in.

"Was he... adopted, by any chance?" she asks hesitantly.

Han gives her such a puzzled look that she knows the answer before he replies.

"No. Of course, not. Why would you think that?"

Rey gives up. "No reason."

A second goes by.

"So, he's... always been a chicken then?" she finally asks.

Han nods, looks at his son, and makes a noise that's somewhere between a sigh and a sniff. "Our beautiful boy."

Finn looks up at them.

"By the way, Chewie says dinner is ready, and you'd better hurry up, because there's not much hot sauce left, and he's tempted to hog it all for himself."

"Oh, I've never had anything with hot sauce before," Rey says excitedly. Her stomach rumbles at the mere mention of food, and she jumps to her feet. "I'd love to try some."

 

* * *

 

The hot sauce is awful.

For someone who's used to living on bland rations that are only sprinkled with the occasional herb during Jakku's all too brief wet season, if feels as if she swallowed a mouthful of gasoline and set it on fire.

While she is still coughing and gasping and wondering why anyone would commit such atrocities against otherwise perfectly serviceable food, her gaze falls on the chicken which is watching her from the other side of the table, where it's been pointedly refusing the bowl of seeds and corn that Chewie put in front of it.

There is something about the look it gives her... something calculating... something spiteful.

The chicken is plotting something. Rey is sure of it.

After chugging about half a gallon of water, Rey excuses herself, deciding to take a nap until they reach the Resistance Base.

She can't remember ever sleeping on anything but hard ground before, and after she strips out of her pants and shirt, she slips under the covers and snuggles into the bunk she's picked out for herself.

She sighs blissfully, and falls asleep.

Five minutes later, the chicken nestles down in the lounge seat and closes its eyes. Han sits down next to it. In a surprising turn of events, the chicken does not attack him for this.

Ten minutes after that, Finn asks Chewie to give him flying lessons in the cockpit.

Another ten minutes go by until Han nods off.

And ten minutes after that, all hell breaks lose.

 

* * *

 

The howling sound of the alarm klaxon has Rey jerking awake and stumbling out of her bunk, reaching for a weapon that isn't there.

She just manages to glimpse the retreating shape of the chicken (wings flapping, mask bobbing on its butt) scurrying out of her room before the doors slide shut behind it.

Blinking the last vestiges of sleep from her eyes, she bends down to retrieve her discarded clothes and freezes mid-motion.

There's a hole in her pants.

The back of her pants, to be precise. Right where her left buttock would be, were she to wear them.

A single, small black feather rests mockingly next to it.

Rey seriously contemplates plucking more than the chicken's tail feathers when she gets a hold of it, but the alarm is still blaring, and she doesn't have any other clothes, so she slips into the pants anyway. She dons the rest of her clothes, before she runs out of her room.

"What's going on?" she yells over the penetrating sound when she meets Han halfway to the cockpit.

"The self-destruct has been activated," he shouts back at her, and then he's dashing past her towards the engineering station before Rey can asks how and why and how much time they have left.

She catches up with him just when he wedges himself into the bowls of the ship and she follows him without hesitation. They check the wiring, the power conduits, and various converters, while Han is cursing a blue streak, and Rey is trying hard not to sweat and keep a steady hand.

Han's swearing abruptly stops, and when Rey turns to him, he's holding up a handful of lose wires with an expression of disbelief.

There's a circuit missing.

Rey is no mind reader, but she would bet an entire week's worth of rations that Han has a pretty good idea who took it.

She pulls herself out of the maintenance duct with a growl.

"Don't hurt him," Han calls after her as he scrambles to follow.

Rey dashes through the cargo hold, when the world goes silent. The sound of the alarm stops abruptly, and she can no longer hear Han calling after her. Nothing exists but the hammering of her own heart, and the figure that suddenly appears in the open door to the storage bay.

"You heard him," Snoke says with his creepy sabercat smile. "Save the chicken, Rey. Don't hurt him."

The distance between them is too short for Rey to stop, and she skids right through him into the brightly lit storage area.

When she turns, the sound comes crashing back, and Snoke is gone.

The escape pod, however is still there, though she can see the timer for the auto-eject ticking down on the control console beside it.

Five seconds left.

She lunges forward. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see the chicken watching her nervously through the pod's viewport.

Four seconds left.

She doesn't know the abort code, so she doesn't even try to guess it. Instead, she grabs the first sharp object she can find, dives beneath the console and slams the tool into the seam of the access panel.

Three second left.

The panel comes off and clatters to the floor.

Two seconds left.

Her hands close around wires and circuit boards, and she grasp as much of it as she can and yanks the whole mess out of the console.

One second left.

The screen goes blank, there's a hiss of steam, (there's always a hiss of steam) and the lights on the launch pad go out.

Panting, heart hammering inside her chest, Rey gets to her feet, walks over to the escape pod and braces her hands on either side of the viewport.

She stares down at the chicken.

The chicken stares back up at her.

The missing circuit lies next to it.

Rey bares her teeth.

The chicken puffs itself up and scratches its claws into the escape pod's inner lining.

"Ben. Oh, thank the stars, you're still here."

Han all but crashes through the doors, his look of relief dropping off his face like a stone cast into water when he takes in the tension in the room. He looks at Rey, bend over the escape pod, and a flush steals up his neck.

"Uhm, Rey? Your... ah, your pants. There's a..."

Rey _growls_ , and Han quickly takes a step back.

Swallowing hard, he gingerly walks toward the other side of the escape pod, giving her a wide berth. It takes him a moment to open the pod, but as soon as the latch snaps back, he picks up his son, who's suddenly docile as a lamb.

The alarm klaxon is still blaring, and Rey grits her teeth, snatches up the circuit, and hurries back to the maintenance duct.

 

* * *

 

"Do you think it's possible that there is a large... a very large, fully sentient species of space chickens that can procreate with humans?" Rey asks haltingly as she cinches the belt on the old pair of cargo pants Han gave her.

Finn gives her a bemused look. "You do realize that you're asking the guy, who grew up isolated in First Order boot camps for the past decade and a half, right?"

"Fair point."

The Falcon drops out of hyperspace.

"It'll be interesting to meet his mother."

 

* * *

 

As it turns out Leia Organa is not a giant space chicken.

She's a tiny woman with a big presence, who's wearing a single black feather in the braids that are coiled practically, yet stylishly atop her head.

She's also a general, and Rey, who's survival has been dependent on making split second assessments of newcomers to Niima outpost, takes in the respect with which she is treated and decides to stay back and hope that Han won't mention that she'd been seconds away from wringing her son's neck.

Leia gasps when Han presents the chicken to her. She's obviously struggling for composure as she reaches out to cradle her son against her chest.

The chicken hold itself stiffly, but doesn't resist.

"Oh, what happened to his beautiful tail?" Leia asks.

Rey takes another step back, hiding herself behind Finn's shoulder.

"It was an accident, dear. Rey was trying to save his life."

Rey hates the blush that steals into her cheeks. She can still feel the burning rage inside her gut that had almost overtaken her when she'd seen the chicken staring up at her from the escape pod, and if Han hadn't shown up in the storage bay...

But she can't remember anyone ever praising her before, and the sensation washes over her, pleasant like a sip of fresh water in the Jakku desert.

Han motions her forward, and Finn gives her a friendly push, and then she's standing in front of Leia who is offering her arm for a hug. Rey would love to get a hug. Before Finn hugged her, she hadn't been hugged in ages.

But the chicken glares at her.

"Thank you, Rey. For saving my son," Leia tells her when Rey doesn't move.

Rey hastily takes her hand, so as not to offend her. "It was nothing," she mumbles bashfully.

 

* * *

 

Rey leaves her staff, Luke's lightsaber, and the rest of her meager belongings in her newly assigned quarters.

Leia invites her to tea, and when she shows up at her rooms, the sight that greets her stops Rey dead in her tracks.

The chicken is strutting across the floor, bright, long tail feathers bobbing behind it.

Rey blinks.

"Well, someone is looking fancy," she says, the words slipping out before she can stop herself.

The rooster stops... and glares at her.

"Is that..." Rey bends forward, careful not to get too close to it. "Did you sew..."

"Yes." Leia is beaming at him. "I took one of my feather head-pieces apart and sewed it onto that silly mask of his. That's a much better purpose for it. You've never seen anything like it?

"No,” Rey says drily. "I can't say I've ever seen a chicken with a toupee on his butt before, but I suppose there's a first time for everything."

Leia burst out laughing. "Oh, you are too cute," she says. "Well, it won't be forever. His feathers will grow back, eventually." She pats the space beside her. "Now, come and have a seat. I want to know everything about you."

The chicken walks out the door.

"Should he be allowed to walk around unsupervised?" Rey asks, half turning to follow it, but Leia waves her back.

"Oh, don't worry about it, dear. How much trouble could he possible get into on D'Qar?"

She pours the tea and asks Rey about her life on Jakku. It's not the most cheerful subject for either of them, but Leia is warm and understanding and has a way of making her feel at ease, and the more they talk the less Rey understands why her son joined the First Order.

That is, until Leia pulls out a holopad and shows her the baby pictures.

"This is us, just after we got the good news," Leia says, voice full of emotions as she shows her a picture of Han holding her in a bridal carry while she cradles an egg in her palms.

"And this is at the baby shower, my friend Amilyn organized. It was such a surprise. Fun and games the whole day long. She really went all out."

A dozen people are grouped around a table, balloons and streamers all over the place, and on the table itself there's a small nest situated beneath a heat lamp. The egg inside the nest is covered in glitter and has a smiley face painted on it.

"And this is my brother Luke, the old prankster," Leia explains with a laugh as she pulls up a picture of a bearded man who smiles toothily at them holding a sharpie in one hand, and the egg in the other. The smiley face now sports a set of fangs and devil horns.

Another picture shows Leia navigating an obstacle course alongside several other parents, who are carrying their children, while Leia balances the egg on a spoon.

It is followed by a picture of Han, turned sideways with a facetiously sinister glower on his face as he holds the egg in his hands. On the kitchen counter in front of him is a frying pan. ("Honestly, between him and Luke, I'm not sure who was the worst practical joker. They were always egging each other on.")

There are more pictures showing Ben after he hatched, a tiny chicklet sitting in the palm of a droid, holding him up for a selfie, scooping him up as he waddles off the hull of the Falcon, and showing him sitting on the ground, looking a little forlorn, in front of a rather intricate and quite beautiful set of patterns he apparently scratched into the soil.

"Why did he leave?" Rey asks as she flips through the pictures on the holopad.

Leia dabs at her eyes. "Oh, Ben always had a bit of a temper, and Luke made one too many cracks about serving chicken legs with hot sauce, if Ben didn't straighten out."

Rey scrunches up her face. "Have you considered serving them with just a bit of herbal seasoning?" she asks earnestly. "It's much more pleasant for your palate. You'd still be able to taste the chicken for one thing."

Leia gives her a long, pensive look. A smile tugs at the corner's of her mouth, but it falls away at Rey's sincerely curious expression.

She awkwardly pats Rey's hand. "My, what an interesting life you must have had," she says and snatches the holopad away from her.

 

* * *

 

When Rey returns to her quarters to get some rest, she walks into a snow storm.

Except that that she's indoors, it's definitely too warm for snow, and the white bits floating in the air around her are not snow flakes, but small feathers and tiny puffs of cotton.

And in the very center of the storm, she finds a black-feathered dervish tearing into her pillow, her sheets, and her mattress with reckless abandon.

Rey screams.

It's not a scream of fear, but a battle cry, and she launches herself at the chicken which dives underneath the bed. Rey doesn't even hesitate and follows it, but by the time she's on the other side, the rooster has fluttered back over the top of it and runs for the door.

Rey chases it into the hallway...

...and crashes into someone who's hurrying past her quarters. The young man steadies her.

"Oh, hi. You're Rey, aren't you?"

Rey is still focused on the chicken and has to visibly reorient herself before she can reply. "Uhm, yes. That's me."

"I'm Poe. Nice to meet you. Listen, I'd love to stay and chat, but we have a bit of a problem, and I need to talk to Leia." He gives her a tiny smile and continues down the corridor.

A sense of foreboding in her gut makes her follow him.

"What kind of problem?" she asks as she falls into step beside him.

Poe gives her a frazzled look and runs his hand through his thick locks. "Ah, well... there's been a breach in our communications. Our location has been compromised."

"Compromised how exactly?" Rey presses.

And that's when the alarm goes off.

Poe winces and starts running.

"Someone sent a distress call to the First Order. We need to evacuate the base," he shouts over his shoulder.

 

* * *

 

The chicken is nowhere to be found.

Rey knows this, because she graciously volunteered to search for it, while the Resistance is organizing the hasty evacuation of D'Qar.

They're barely halfway through loading the transports, when a Star Destroyer drops out of hyperspace above the planet.

It is the only ship that arrives, and even though Leia immediately orders the X-wings into the air, it doesn't attack them.

Instead, a large cruiser detaches from the hull and when it lands outside the base, and the hatch lowers, Rey and half the Resistance collectively hold their breath and raise their weapons wondering what the First Order is up to.

They keep wondering for several minutes, before Poe exchanges a look with Leia and steps forward.

"Hello?" he calls up the hatch. "Anyone in there?"

The wild squawking that suddenly rings in the air doesn't come from inside the ship, but from behind them.

"Ben," Han and Leia call out as the chicken races past them and up the loading ramp without a backwards glance. Han and Chewie run after it, even as the hatch starts to close.

Rey curses and turns to Poe. "Does the base have a self-destruct?"

Poe blinks at her. "What? No."

"How about the shuttles?"

"Not... not really. I mean, I suppose technically you could..."

Rey grabs Finn by the shoulder and runs towards the cruiser. "Tell them to check," Rey yells back at him. "And have a look at any ammunition that could be rigged into bombs or booby traps. Just in case."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Just trust me, okay?"

She and Finn pull themselves onto the raised ramp and immediately slide down the other side, crashing into the cargo hold. Neither Han, nor Chewie, or the chicken are anywhere in sight.

"We have to make sure the ship doesn't leave orbit," Rey whispers as she gets to her feet.

"We should probably try and find some sort of weapon first," Finn suggests, and Rey nods at him.

They split up, Finn stepping into the storage area to the left of them, while Rey starts rummaging through the compartments on her right. A vibration runs through the ship as the engines start up, but their low thrum is abruptly cut off. Rey stiffens as a shiver runs down her spine, and she drops the crowbar she just found.

It falls to the floor without a sound.

"Do tell," Snoke says mockingly from behind her. "How is my dear Kylo?"

Rey's hands ball into fists. She whirls around.

"What the hell do you want from me?" she hisses quietly so Finn won't overhear.

"I already told you. I want you to save the chicken, Rey."

"Why? What's so damn special about that bloody chicken?"

"Everyone wants you to save him. Is that not enough?"

"No."

Snoke smiles, and it makes her nauseated, because for a moment – just for a second – he looks almost proud of her.

"He is a lesson that you need to learn."

"What lesson?"

Snoke leans forward. There's a shiver of blue lightning running up his arm. Rey braces herself, but the hit doesn't come. Instead, Snoke's smile widens.

"You will know it when you learned it."

Behind him, Finn suddenly steps back into the cargo bay and freezes. His eyes go wide and his mouth drops open. He's clearly saying something, but Rey can't hear a single word.

"Save the chicken, Rey," Snoke says, his voice fading along with his body. And then he raises his hand, and a bolt of Force lightning pulls her off her feet.

She crashes to the ground with a shout, and Finn is beside her in a second.

"What the fuck was that?" he asks as he helps her to her feet.

Rey's muscles are still twitching, and she has to shake out her limbs in order to regain control of them. "That was Snoke."

"Snoke? As in _Supreme Leader Snoke_? Holy shit, that is not what I expected. He looks..."

"Like a cacodeman mated with a sabercat, I know, right?"

"More like a sabercat, who's had an acid bath, but I get your point. What does he want from you?"

Rey retrieves the crowbar from the floor. She wants to smash something with it.

"He wants me to save the chicken," she says and takes an experimental swing with it. It's not the same as her trusty staff, but it will do. It feels good in her hands.

"I get that he might want him back, but why does he want _you_ to get him?" Finn asks.

"I have no idea," Rey snarls. She swings the crowbar again and imagines launching Kylo or Ben or whatever his name is straight into orbit. "Save the chicken. That's all he keeps telling me. Save the chicken, Rey."

She growls.

"You know what I want to do? I want to pluck that damn chicken and serve it to him for dinner."

"That... that's a bit harsh. Think about Han and Leia."

But Rey doesn't listen. She stalks toward the doors.

"I want to tear him limb from limb and feed him to a whole coop of chickens. See if he's still smiling that creepy smile then."

"Bloodthirsty, but okay."

Rey abruptly stops halfway down the corridor.

"No, you know what I'm going to do?"

Finn looks almost afraid to ask.

"I'm going to take over this shuttle, just so I can carve the words 'FUCK THAT CHICKEN' into the side of that Star Destroyer up there and fly it right up his wrinkly old... what the kriffing kriff?" she flinches away as something small and white flings itself at her, and claws sink into her arm.

"Why are there more chickens?" she shouts as she tries to fend them off.

Half a dozen of them are swarming her and Finn, and by the time she manages to grab one of them and fling it away from her, another takes its place.

In the end, the two of them run cursing and shouting back the way they came. When they round a corner, they see Han and Chewie gesturing to them from the cargo hold, and they dash through the doors, Chewie slamming them shut behind them.

"What the hell is going on?" Finn asks, panting.

"It's the Knights of Ren," Han tells them with a perfectly straight face.

Rey turns back towards the doors.

"The Knights of Ren," she repeats in a flat voice.

"Yeah."

"And they are all hens."

Han and Finn give her an odd look.

"Does that matter?"

"Well, let's just say that it's a good thing General Hux died on Starkiller, or we'd be having a very uncomfortable conversation about missed opportunities right now."

A loud, deep squawk makes them look toward the corridor.

"That's Ben," Han says, relief washing over his face. "It's alright now. He won't let them hurt us."

"He tried to blow up the Falcon while we were on it," Finn reminds him, but Han is already opening the doors.

Six white hens stand in a v-shaped formation with their backs to them as Kylo Ren stalks confidently towards them from the other end of the corridor.

Han darts forward, calling his son's name.

As if listening to a silent command, five of the hens turn toward them and advance.

Han stops dead in his tracks.

The hens stop as well.

Back in the corridor, the sixth hen takes two steps toward Kylo and raises her hackle feathers. Kylo stops strutting.

"On, no. That's not supposed to happen." Han breathes.

"What exactly..." Finn starts, but Rey got him covered.

"She's challenging him."

"But he's their leader."

Rey shrugs apathetically. "Maybe Snoke has other plans."

The hen launches herself at Kylo, and the two of them disappear in a cloud of feathers and screeches.

"You need to help him," Finn says.

Rey gives him a startled look. "I really don't."

"Maybe that's what Snoke meant when he told you to save the chicken, Rey. You're supposed to fight by his side."

"Why the hell would I do anything that Snoke wants?"

"Because if he loses a fight against a Knight of Ren, he'll..."

"Lose his place in the pegging order?" Rey asks dryly.

Finn and Han give her a reproachful look.

Chewie is struggling with a sudden coughing fit.

In the end, it is the sight of Han's disappointed face as he charges the hens barring their way, that propels Rey into action. She wouldn't have thought that it would be so hazardous for four grown adults to fight off five chickens, but they are fast and sneaky little buggers, and their claws and beaks are sharp.

By the time she fights her way to the pair of combatants and tosses a handful of feathers into the white hen's face so Kylo can take advantage of her distraction and pin her beneath him, they're scratched and bruised all over.

Kylo barely pauses after Rey gets a hold of the hen and secures her underneath her arm.

He looks up at her for a long, long moment... and starts to dance.

Rey stares at him in disbelief as he spreads his wings and walks around her, dipping the wing closest to her lower than the other, while Finn looks on in obvious confusion.

"Is he– is he challenging you to a fight?" Finn asks warily.

Rey bites her lip. "Not– eh, not exactly, no."

There's a faint blush on Han's cheeks as he bends down and picks up his son, who immediately makes his displeasure known at being carried around again.

Han apparently believes that one more scratch isn't going to make much of a difference.

They lock up the Knights of Ren and turn the cruiser around.

When they land on the planet, the evacuation is almost complete, and they spend ten minutes scavenging the cruiser for equipment and resources, before they join the last members of the Resistance on board the Falcon and jump into hyperspace.

They take the Knights of Ren with them.

The Star Destroyer in orbit doesn't fire a single shot.

 

* * *

 

When they set up camp on a different planet, Ben is confined to his quarters.

Rey would have preferred a cell, considering that he tried to bring the entire First Order down on them, but she still counts it as a win.

That is, until she walks down the corridor, hoping to finally, _finally_ get some sleep before they sit down for dinner, and comes upon that damn chicken as it leaves her rooms.

She stops walking.

The chicken sees her and freezes.

It glances back into her quarters nervously, but the doors close before Rey can make out whatever damage it has done this time.

Silence descends around them.

Rey bares her teeth.

A random tumbleweed falls out of an alternate universe and rolls between them, only to fall into _another_ alternate universe on the other side of the corridor, never to be seen again.

Rey's flexes her fingers above the hilt of Luke's lightsaber that she wears clasped to her belt.

"You've got nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. It's just you and me now, Kylo." Somewhere a chrono strikes twelve. "Just you and me."

The chicken squawks.

 

* * *

 

"So what are you going to do, now?" Finn asks when he sits down next to Poe in the mess hall. "Starkiller is gone, you captured the Knights of Ren. What's next?"

Poe pauses with his fork halfway to his mouth. "Actually, the Knights of Ren kind of..." He shifts uncomfortably. "Well, they kind of... escaped," he finally admits.

"Oh, hell no," Finn grumbles. "They're going to bring the First Order right back down on us."

"No, no, no." Poe hastens to assure them. "They didn't take a ship. We made sure they're all secured. New access codes and pass keys. They won't be getting off the planet any time soon. And communications have been restricted to key personnel only, so they can't send a message to the First Order either."

"You're still going to go after them, though. Right?" Finn asks as he's loading up his plate with fresh vegetables and meat.

"Sure, but it's a big forest out there. Won't be easy to find them. On the plus side, they won't be able to do much damage either."

Chewie makes a grumbling noise of satisfaction and reaches for the hot sauce.

Rey watches him with a sigh. "I will never understand why you would burn off your taste buds like this." She cuts into her own meat. "Light seasoning, that's the way to go."

"By the way," Poe says around a full mouth. "Thank you for offering to go hunting for us. That was really nice of you."

Rey swallows and nods, waving off his gratitude. "Don't mentioned it. There were a bunch of wild fowl running around the place, and we have a very simple hunting creed on Jakku."

"Oh, yeah? What's that?" Poe asks.

Rey pauses and gives him a wide, sabercat smile.

"If you're not fast enough, you're food."

Poe seems to ponder this for a moment, before he nods.

"Makes sense," he finally says and digs into his meal.

  
  


 


End file.
